Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

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WjS
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Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#1 Post by WjS » 21 Feb 2023, 19:13

Hello fellow members.
I'm willem from NL.
As I am regularly away from home and firm against "smart" meters I started exploring ESP end of 2021.
First tried to read my (intelligent) "domme" digital meter with optical head and espeasy. But found a lot of
information about Tasmota so I changed course and my meter is now reporting like I wish.
Recently I installed a solar panel on my balcony ( Balkon Kraftwerk) that I am monitoring with a Shelly plug.
I noticed the energy I daily consume rises and to find out the details from my (mini)solar installation I acquired
an old "Smart meter" (Itron ACE4000) with the idea i would have two possibilities for electronic reporting.
Optical only states name and P1 seems not completely as it should. After some failed attemps with Tasmota I'm back
with ESPEASY. Enabling serial port 9600 7E1 shows log files with unknown commands with p1 message parts.
P1 gateway says cliënt connected but no output in putty (serial enabled and disabled) old version espeasy from
esp8266thingies.nl gave notification p1 data corrupt!. Ser2net gives nice putty output but no mqtt I use on my mobile phone.
SerialProxy (09082021) sends mqtt v:"!" but regex does not seem to work without proper instructions (only need to filter out 3 values)
and P1 message is compact (460 char/byte). Serial proxy is reporting succesfull lines. Will try to send putty output. Any suggestions?
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Ath
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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#2 Post by Ath » 21 Feb 2023, 19:44

Hi Willem,

The "Command unknown" messages are caused by the Serial port being enabled on the Tools/Advanced page. When that's enabled, any input on HWSerial0 is interpreted as commands, so all data from the smart meter is read that way.

The current release version of ESPEasy can't easily send the P1 data via MQTT, but there is an open pull request on Github that is supposed to change that. If you have a Github account (free) you can download the latest PR build from this link once the build I just started is completed. You can update via Tools page (Update Firmware button), best would be to use the same Collection C build you have now.
That version of the plugin also supports reading the P1 data without having a network connection to the plugin.

None of the ESPEasy versions currently supports parsing the separate values from the P1 datagram, that's in a feature request, but not yet implemented.
/Ton (PayPal.me)

WjS
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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#3 Post by WjS » 22 Feb 2023, 00:57

HI Ath,

Thanks for your swift reply.
I allready understood the reason for command unknown messages but wanted to show serial messages are arriving.
The complete P1 message is not that important, I just want the 1.8.0, 2.8.0 and perhaps 1.7.0 values.
Was hoping I could use serial messages with rules to get these values with P1 gateway but this plugin does not seem to work, for the ACE4000 in any case (no corruption message, possibly caused by the semicolon). So, to be frank, I don't have high hopes for a new version.
Had hoped Serial Proxy could be a solution but regex is not working like I hoped (only few non standard espressions in ino file?, but i'm no programmer). Could be usefull plugin when working well and properly documented (select string starting point/character). Ser2net is working fine for putty but mqtt does not work and rules are difficult (when working) because there is only one serial event (/ACE5ACE4KGPRS).
When output through putty or alike is "so easy" and working why is it so difficult to pass this info line by line through rules to mqtt?
(Started with the latest energy bin but that ser2net plugin didn'n have the no client option). In my honest opinion the latest merge for p1gateway and ser2net might have caused some problems? I have tried many versions and hardware and after setup I do not plan to look at the interface often, so a working older version would be fine. Perhaps an older version of Serial Proxy?
I understand you guys are working your buds of for a free app and I thank you all for that. I'm sorry I can't help, I'm not someone to ask assistance easely, but I have spend hours and my eyes can't work for long. So thanks and keep up the good work. Cherio.

WjS
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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#4 Post by WjS » 24 Feb 2023, 23:51

Hi Ath and others,

Here an update on my problems.
When I was looking everywhere for alternative firmwares I stumbled on the dutch website 8266thingies. Because I couldn't find the password for their firmware I contacted owner Ronald Leenes whose name I also spotted in the P044 ino. I was aware of some differences in the various DSMR versions like baudrate and parity. But he explained that because of crc check in newer meters the old ascii check has been removed. Unfortunately you can't find this in the documents. But Ronald did me a great favor building me his version adapted for my meter. After some small MQTT problems this is now running like a charme. I do have to make a separat web login to get MQTT running (there is no noclient option). Although he has great hard- en software especialy for P1, perhaps it is usefull to find out what he has done and incorporate this in any new P1 gateway version (or recreate a special version for DSMR 2 meters?). I will follow the progress but for now I am very thankfull and satisfied for his and your assistance.
Thx Ath, Thx Romix123.
Grtz Willem

TD-er
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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#5 Post by TD-er » 25 Feb 2023, 00:31

If there are improvements to be made to the P1 plugin, I'm all ears.
So if you can share his changes (or maybe he can, or contact me)?

WjS
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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#6 Post by WjS » 03 Mar 2023, 21:52

Hi TD-er Gijs.
I have contacted Ronald. He has build a complete new version of P1 (Wifi) Gateway not a plugin.
That does not support DSMR 2 and 9600 baud, but he had a tweaked version for a member of his family
that (perhaps with small adjustments for me) worked perfectly in my situation. The basic source code is free
and can be found on github. You can contact him there directly, he is no member of Espeasy forum.
Like I stated before I think it would nice when documentation would mention that the present P1 plugin only
works for DSMR 4 and up. Ronald suggested he might add the changes to the source code.
Problem solved?
Kind regards,
Willem

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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#7 Post by TD-er » 03 Mar 2023, 23:04

I searched for his name, but is it 'the one' from the university of Tilburg?

WjS
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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#8 Post by WjS » 04 Mar 2023, 00:20

Hi Gijs,

I suppose so because on his website http://www.ronaldleenes.nl/category/stuff/ you will find information about his P1 Wifi Gateway you can also find on his Esp8266thingies.nl. You can find his email there and on the github page https://github.com/romix123/P1-wifi-gateway. Even his avatar shows some resemblance.
But I never met him just did the same investigation you do.
Good Luck and greetings.
William.

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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#9 Post by TD-er » 04 Mar 2023, 11:20

I looked through the code you linked and it is quite easy to read and understand.

So I linked to it in this already existing issue: https://github.com/letscontrolit/ESPEasy/issues/3875

I will try to work on it right after I'm done with this project I'm still working on.
Hopefully that's in like 2 or 3 weeks, so please remind me when I haven't shown any activity on the topic by then :)

romix
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Re: Itron ACE4000 P1 Gateway, Proxy or Ser2Net all fail

#10 Post by romix » 24 Jan 2024, 09:49

TD wrote:
I searched for his name, but is it 'the one' from the university of Tilburg?
Yes, that's the one.
btw, the new firmware that people have been talking about lives at github. romix123/p1-wifi-gateway

Ronald

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